Shrike
by Rikkamaru
Summary: The man responded first. "I...yes. We're fine, thank you. Um...who exactly are you?" He looked nervous to be asking, as if afraid Tim would respond poorly to the question. And that. That made absolutely no sense.
1. Chapter 1

Don't own any part of the DCU.

Just Bad Luck

* * *

"I'm beginning to think that Damian and I should stop trying to work together," were the first words to pass Tim's lips as he woke up to find himself propped up on a wall in Gotham, Red Robin outfit not as torn up as he had feared it would be.

Truly, Tim was willing to give the child a chance, but he would appreciate if in return Damian would stop trying to sabotage him every chance he gets. With a small grunt, the teen got to his feet and began to try and place himself. He glanced out of the alleyway, found a street sign, and nodded. Okay, he was still in Gotham, that was reassuring. Near one of the less used areas of Crime Alley, and the desire to curse Damian out increased even further. Less used or not, the brat could have gotten him killed by dumping Tim's body here.

He next took inventory, sighing in relief that he still had all of his equipment on hand and undamaged. A quick running jump and wall run had him perched on one of the buildings that had been hiding him. He looked at the area and his unease grew.

It had been hard to tell the time in the alleyway with the smog that ever covered the Gotham skyline but now he had a clear view of the area and a better approximation of the time. And the time appeared to be around 8 PM. _What the hell._

Has he been out for over twenty hours? Why hadn't anyone looked for him? As he wracked his brain over these questions, he thought he saw a flash of a memory but couldn't quite place it. Okay, so it looks like he might have lost his most recent memories and with them the reason he was left in an alley for over twenty hours.

Fantastic.

Tim resigned himself to the youngest Robin's scorn and taunting as he began to move toward the Cave. Maybe Dick will pity him and tell him what the hell happened and why they didn't look for him.

Three streets later however Tim's attention was grabbed as he came across a standard mugging. The guy with the gun looked particularly twitchy as he threatened the family. If Tim demanded he leave them be the guy might pull the trigger out of sheer nerves. With a small sigh Tim threw a Red Robin disk at the gun, sending it flying out of the man's hand. Before he could react Tim was there sweeping the mugger's legs out from underneath him. He let the guy have a moment to see the glowering cowl of the Red Robin before he knocked him out and zip tied his hands together.

Now that the man was safely neutralized Tim turned to look at the family, ignoring the strange wave of déjà vu that washed over him as he took in their surprised faces. "Are you all alright?" He asked gently, looking away briefly to bag the gun before returning his gaze to them.

The man responded first. "I...yes. We're fine, thank you. Um...who exactly are you?" He looked nervous to be asking, as if afraid Tim would respond poorly to the question. And that. That made absolutely no sense. New to Gotham perhaps?

No. Even when they were new to Gotham, people were aware of the Batman and have some cursory idea of the birds that patrol alongside him. Eyes narrowing beneath his cowl Tim gave them a sheepish smile to try and calm them down. The boy and woman relaxed a little as he'd hoped but the man remain wary. "Don't really have a name yet," Tim said lightly, lying through his teeth as only a Bat could. He thought briefly of various birds with his coloration. "I've been considering Shrike, but it's still in the air."

The man nodded hesitantly, but seemed willing to believe him. "I see. Thank you...Shrike, for saving me and my family. My name is Thomas Wayne, and this is my wife Martha and my son Bruce."

Tim thinks Thomas might have said more but it was lost as a roaring filled his ears and a feeling as if the world itself were ending uncurled in his stomach.

Oh.

 _Fuck._

* * *

Tim wondered if this was karma getting back at him for when he survived bleeding out with only a lost spleen during his quest to save Bruce when the man was lost in time as he stood next to ten year old Bruce while the boy's most definitely _alive_ parents called the police on the mugger, Tim holding out his cape to protect the child from the rain that had started up. Tiny Bruce gave him a grateful look and shifted a little closer, small hand grabbing at the end of Tim's Red Robin – now potentially _Shrike_ – tunic and Tim felt a piece of his soul shrivel up.

Well, good news first: Tim didn't immediately die upon saving Martha and Thomas Wayne, implying he was either not in his own world's timeline as Bruce had been or, upon saving them – or, you know, _running around in his outfit_ – a new universe branched off of his own and that was where he was now.

Bad news next: Tim was in the past, and now everything he knew literally meant nothing because _he saved_ _Bruce fucking_ _Wayne's parents_. Also, there was no Cave, no family, no friends, and he was stuck with nothing but what he had on him.

Honestly, the only stuff he had on him for the "lost in time" scenario were a few gold rings and a hundred and fifty dollars in cash.

They didn't expect the "lost in time" scenario to happen as often as it does, apparently.

As the two stood there Tim began to make some plans. He needed some clothes first, but a trip to a thrift store sans cape and cowl should be enough to only garner mildly curious looks before being dismissed as a cosplayer of some sort. The cash he had on hand should be more than enough to get two sets of clothing there and a backpack. Next would be falsifying some documents until he could weasel a real driver's license for himself.

He'd also need a new identity, Tim realized with a wince. Timothy Jackson Drake wasn't born yet, but the Drakes wouldn't appreciate a person popping out of the woodwork claiming to be a family member. Or perhaps they would; the Drakes were never good at keeping up with where family was located, and he knew enough of his family's genealogy to make himself a distant relative to the Gotham Drakes. From there the Drakes would help a down on their luck distant relative get back on their feet, and he will live comfortably enough to figure out what to do from there.

But should he go with Timothy still? It's a common enough name, but would it cause the alternate version of him to be given a different name? If not, how would people distinguish which Tim they were talking to? He could enter and maintain a different persona relatively easily, especially one where all he had to really keep track of was a new name and altered history rather than personality, but until he was sent back to his own world, or forever should that not come to pass? He could live with a similar sounding or similar meaning name...

Plan somewhat formed, Tim looked down as he registered a tug on his tunic and watched as Bruce seemed to shuffle his feet a little before turning to him. "I wanted to thank you for saving us," the boy mumbled, staring at the emblem on Tim's chest. "If you hadn't..."

"You're quite welcome," Tim said solemnly, the arm with the outstretched cape in hand moving and pulling Bruce a little closer in an attempt to comfort him. "I would however recommend that you and your parents not walk around in Crime Alley dressed as lavishly should you need to do so again; I may not be there next time."

Bruce nodded, hand tightening before his other arm came up and wrapped around him in an awkward hug that made Tim tense in surprise before he let go and returned to his mother. Once there he began looking at his feet, only stopping to glance at Tim. The teen really hoped that this _wasn't_ the hero-worship he thought it was. That would just be too strange for Tim's poor mind to bear.

With the police on their way Tim bid them all a goodbye and fired his grappling gun, disappearing into the evening.

* * *

It took three weeks of careful movement and planning before Timothy Jackson Drake was sitting in his new apartment with a new bank account under the name of Stephen Alvin Drake, second cousin once removed from the youngest Drake, the computer gauntlet he'd thankfully stowed in his equipment and running in his hands. Tim – Stephen – had never been more grateful for distractedly throwing his computer gauntlet in with the rest of his stuff when the Demon Brat started making a fuss about how they hadn't left for patrol yet than he was right then. Looking at the low-tech surrounding him made him want to cry and he never thought he'd hate the past more than he did right then.

To be fair he had no idea why the gauntlet was working when wireless was barely a thing from what he's seen, but if he had to guess it was likely due to the ridiculous amounts of alien tech he'd upgraded it with to make it compatible with as many vehicles and devices as possible.

(He knew that his gauntlet was a primary source frustration for the other Bats as they could never get into the thing. The password was an encrypted answer to a Tamaranean riddle Kori once told him when she had been visiting Jason, and it continued to stump his family for quite some time.)

The Drakes had asked him if he needed anything beyond the amount they'd put in his bank account and first month of apartment rent but he'd waved them off with a smile, saying he could take it from there. While he could continue to take advantage of their generosity, Tim – Stephen, his name was _Stephen_ now dammit – didn't want to be even more in their debt than he already was. Currently he had buffered the bank account with some money he'd siphoned from…less than scrupulous people that he felt no particular sympathy toward. He then sent enough evidence to have those same people arrested immediately to the GCPD as an anonymous tip, so he should be fairly secure with his new acquisitions now.

In those three weeks Stephen had metaphorically thrown his hands in the air and given up on being subtle about his existence to other Gothamites. Gotham wasn't too bad off currently, but she would always need a vigilante to keep watch over her and, with Bruce probably never becoming Batman and all the shit that would follow _that_ particular butterfly, that duty fell to Stephen. So Shrike was seen – never on camera, he won't make his original Bruce facepalm _too_ badly, but everything else was free game – cape fluttering and cowl staring down from his perch on the gargoyles (suck it, Jason, at least he was skinny enough that slipping off of those was never an issue).

Honestly, Gotham seemed to respond positively to Shrike. Considering that the main Rogues were either too young or not villains yet, all Stephen had to deal with were the common Gotham scum – gangs, drug runners, rapists, murderers, and human traffickers being the primary offenders – and they were all rather intimidated by a man who could kick their ass while dressed up in tights and a cape. From what Stephen's seen from the news, crime was at a low from the top guns, who were too freaked out to make big waves while the little guys still thought Shrike was just some new boogeyman invented to try and scare them. And the police were currently sticking their heads in the sand and pretending he didn't exist, which worked fine for Stephen so long as they picked up the perps he caught and left zip tied on the ground for them.

And while he didn't have the extended network of information that Oracle did – he's literally been in the city for less than a month, and the level of advancement in technology made him want to stab something repeatedly, so that was forgivable – Stephen was still an accomplished hacker and by the end of week two had all of the computers from the major gangs he hadn't wiped off the map constantly updating him with changes in information.

During that time, once he'd confirmed that no one from his universe had appeared as well to take him home, he also paid for all of the legal documentation he could need and was reasonable to have in Gotham – considering that hospitals and universities lost records every few years due to something or another, that honestly wasn't a lot of documents. Just enough to be the same as every Gothamite – a paper birth certificate, a social security card as well as that number hacked by yours truly into the system, and the physical copy of a degree from a school that was burned to the ground three months ago, which would explain his lack of a job and money to any unreasonably nosy employer. And, for security reasons, Stephen also made sure to wipe his info from the guy's databases and point those transactions to another one of his clients, just in case. Now he could get a legitimate nine-to-five and have more of an alibi for any questions regarding money in his account.

Now to get a job and try and figure out what the hell to do from there.

* * *

Well, I hope you guys like this. It's all going to be sketchy and vague at parts, as I don't know as much about the comics as I wish I did. I'm trying to work on that, but it's slow going.

Thanks for reading and please review.


	2. Chapter 2

Don't own any part of the DCU.

Chapter 2

* * *

Stephen knew he was playing a dangerous game as he applied to work at a tiny software industry where the CEO nearly had a heart attack when he clarified that _yes, he was from THAT Drake family_ , but if you took in his situation from the point of view of a Drake it wasn't much of a surprise. The Drakes only really cared about the main line, and Drake as his last name or not, he was a second cousin once removed from the current heir and as such meant very little to them. So long as he didn't embarrass them he could basically do as he pleased with little issue.

And Stephen took gleeful advantage of that and joined a small starting company he'd never heard of before that would likely tank in a few years so that he could work with a fairly unregulated schedule and wouldn't make huge waves in the companies that he knew would thrive. The language was a bit more archaic than what he was used to so Stephen spent some of his free time practicing with it and making a few programs for personal use. There were about twenty other people at the company and he soon found that he got along well with them once they understood that he was a listener more than a talker (he was _not_ going to fuck up by accidentally talking about the future if he could help it).

So now he had a steady income at a company near enough to his apartment that he didn't need a personal vehicle immediately, a background and the documents needed to back it up, and a base of operations that worked for the time being, now the next stage of burrowing into the city could begin.

For one, he needed to start setting up safe houses. This was much more difficult in this time, both due to less buildings existing and, ironically enough, more people both being _alive_ and living spread out due to the lack of heavy damage-dealing villains running amuck in the city. Stephen had managed to find a warehouse and car garage that were all abandoned and needed to monitor them until he was sure no one would barge in at an inopportune time before he started kitting them out.

Stephen also made sure to leave territories less patrolled for the criminals he was scaring up, so that they retreated to them and didn't do anything drastic like cornered rats. Stephen was too much of a realist to think that he would be able to completely eliminate crime in Gotham, but limiting it to certain areas was already doing good from what he's seen.

And, despite all of these tasks and things to work on to establish himself within the world, Stephen still found that he had far too much time on his hands compared to the never ending slog that was his previous universe. With a small mental shrug he took up visiting the tabletop store near his house (because of course he made sure one of those was nearby when looking for a place to live) and began to self-study photography more extensively.

Overall Stephen was content with his progress with establishing himself as a vigilante in a younger Gotham, though it could lead to quite a few more enemies for him than he wanted. From the looks of things he had landed in the generational gap between the JSA and the JLA, which will mean either no appropriately aged super powered enemies for him to fight or a rise in new villains with the introduction of a hero earlier than planned.

Stephen hummed to himself as he wrote down key events in the Bat Family's lives – useless or not, he was _not_ going to lose this information to a concussion – in coded Tamaranean in a small notebook he planned to keep in a false bottom in his nightstand drawer.

So.

He's figured out where to live.

He's figured out what to do (sort of. At this point he's going with "adapt and survive").

He's figured out how to do it.

All that's left is to figure out who to do it with and against, and that'll likely take him a few years.

He can do this.

 **Linebreak**

Stephen tried really, _really_ hard not to stare, but it was a near thing.

He had been winding down his patrol by doing a quick round around the upper-class section, turning a half-interested eye to the house he and his parents lived in after he'd discovered Batman and Robin's secret identities. He moved on after registering that some other family was indeed living there and had been heading back to his apartment when he heard the definite sounds of fighting taking place in an alleyway (because where else would they be taking place, honestly). But when he dropped by to see what was happening, he came across this situation, that made him stop. And _stare_.

Because that was most definitely a _man dressed up in a Bat suit_ beating the crap out of a mugger.

But his style was definitely more like a brawler's than it was any of the training Bruce had gone through, and the man himself was wider in the middle than any of the Bats Stephen had interacted with, with less muscle than even Stephen had from the looks of things and more normal human percentages of body fat.

When the man finished he looked around, preparing to flee, and Stephen was tempted to let him go, tempted to ignore this ever happened and continue on.

Alas, his curiosity wouldn't allow such a moment to escape his grasp.

"You may want to take to carrying these around," he said and, when the man spun around to confront a potential enemy, tossed him some of his zip ties. "That is, if you're going to continue joining me on my gig."

The man stared at the zip ties in his hands before clearing his throat and looking up. "Thank you," he said, and _wow_ , he even had the _voice_. _What the fuck is going on_.

Stephen smiled despite himself and rocked on his heels a little. "No problem. Least I can do for a fellow costume-aficionado such as you. What brings you to the streets of Gotham. Or, were you here before me? Want me to clear out? I heard Blü dhaven's a mess and a half all year long."

The banter did its job and calmed the man down, but he was quick to tense again at the last part. "You don't have to leave. I don't do this often, really only every few months. I certainly think the city is safer with you here."

The two spoke for a while longer before the Batman (and _man_ was that still a trip) ran off and Red Robin idly called the police and gave them the details and address of the criminal before he also skedaddled. When he got home Stephen still wasn't sure that everything that just happened _wasn't_ one hell of a fever dream and went to bed with a lot of confusion and _what the hells_ echoing in his mind.

 **Linebreak**

Bruce winced a little from the force of his knees hitting the roof he was on as he hurriedly ducked out of view. He held his breath, counting the seconds, until he heard the sound he'd all but trained himself to pick up on, a grapple gun being fired, and peeked over the ledge.

His hands fumbled for the camera around his neck as he registered the red-and-black costume he'd been looking for. Positioning it as well as he could, he timed the sound of the shutter to booted feet hitting the roof across from him. He took two more when noise rose up around them, before stowing the camera away to simply _watch_.

Shrike was taking a break at the moment, head turning slowly as he scanned the streets below them, and in the moonlight he looked like some sort of bloodstained gargoyle perched on the building's ledge. He shifted, letting his cape envelop his body and turn him into a dark silhouette that was near indistinguishable in the Gotham night. Bruce continued to watch and fiddled with his camera before deciding against taking a picture. There was too high of a chance of Shrike picking up the sound or flash now, and it was getting too late. His mom or Alfred might notice that he's not in bed if they decide to check up on him.

When Shrike turned away to observe other streets Bruce quickly got off the roof and carefully made his way back down to the asphalt. When he touched the ground he looked up in time to see Shrike grapple onto a larger building and swing away, and felt his breath catch a little in response.

Shrike was so cool.

 **Linebreak**

What he would never know was that Stephen _had_ noticed him upon the second photo being taken, and had felt the denial he'd harbored when he was first stranded in this time rise back with a vengeance. No, he told himself sternly despite the lighting and his own subtle watching telling him otherwise. It was _not_ little Bruce Wayne that was taking photos of him. Despite the boy not being that far away (he was clearly new to rooftop stalking – he didn't have an optimal scope and so compensated with sneaking closer) and looking like tiny Bruce Wayne the last time he'd seen him, it couldn't have been him.

Because Stephen might die from the sheer irony of the world if that was indeed him.

He shadowed tiny not-Bruce on his journey back to not-Wayne Manor, careful to stick to the darker shadows and not using the grapple gun as the kid probably tailed him long enough to recognize the sound at this point (it's not cheating if he uses _personal experience_ to figure something out, shut up Dick). Once the boy had safely snuck back into his house, Stephen quickly left and returned to his patrol, mind occupied with the fears of ten-year-old Bruce following him into active gang territory or within an area controlled by the older crimes families.

He forcibly tore himself away from those thoughts by swinging into the shadows of the Park Row Theater, watching the people coming and going in a direct contrast to the theater – or even the Crime Alley – of his world. The Wayne's deaths had been the nail in the coffin for the theater, and it had quickly fallen bankrupt alongside the other businesses on the street within months of their murder.

Knowing all of this, it was quite jarring to see an immediate ripple from the changes he's made to the timeline in the form of a constant stream of people entering and leaving the theater, a police car parked outside the theater at nearly all times (corrupt or not, it would probably deter any petty thief with a gun), a somewhat lighter mood within Crime Alley itself; it all reeked of _change_.

It made Stephen a little uncomfortable. Like sure, he was happy Bruce could have a normal childhood (relatively speaking, as he was still the sole heir to a rather wealthy family and currently possibly-maybe-sorta stalking Shrike at night) but he had no idea what else would happen. Would Stephanie be born? Jason? _Tim_?

The idea that he could have prevented younger-him or any of the others from being born made him sick.

He forcefully cut those thoughts short and grappled away, aiming for the Old Gotham district. He needed to see if the Clocktower was a viable spot for a headquarters (and honestly, he should've thought of that earlier. His Theater was in use, but the _Clocktower_ – from what he'd researched in his own time, that thing hadn't been used regularly in centuries. They just fixed it every so often to keep up the veneer of it being used. Now he just needed to confirm that it was the same in this timeline) and then wrap up his rough draft of a patrol. He still needed to refine that thing, but that required knowing what parts of Gotham needed a closer eye and what were fine with the GCPD patrolling them.

He arrived there in little time and examined the place with barely concealed excitement. It looked rundown and like it needed some _serious_ TLC, but it would definitely be a great place to set up shop. He jumped up into the rafters and lounged there, looking down at the barren room and seeing nothing but _potential_.

Oh yes.

The Clocktower would do nicely for his purposes.

* * *

Sorry if the flow seems off, guys, I struggled a lot with this chapter.

So yeah, already we're seeing changes! You'll all likely figure out who the current Batman is, but it was an entertaining fun fact to run into while looking up things on the wiki so I decided to make it a more significant thing in this world.

Thanks for reading and please review.


	3. Chapter 3

Don't own the DCU.

Chapter 3

* * *

Jack Drake was a fascinating teenager, in Stephen's opinion. He was very much a miniature version of the man Stephen had called Dad when he was young, in love with cultures and civilizations that had been extinct for centuries but flighty, irresponsible in a way that spoke of his parents' lack of a firm hand in his upbringing.

The sixteen year old didn't really acknowledge Stephen often, too caught up in his own world, but occasionally he would drop by his cousin's apartment to talk about some new archaeological discovery or another. This time, however, he came in with a rather small puppy tucked under his arm.

"What's with the new pet?" Stephen asked, letting the puppy sniff his hand and petting its back when it slumped tiredly into his palm. It was shivering, and Stephen hid a frown as he tugged it closer to his body.

"Hm?" Jack looked up from his spot on the couch as Stephen moved to sit on the ground, having been distracted by the book he'd brought with him. "Oh, my mom and dad got him for me. Something about teaching me responsibility? Which is ridiculous, it's not like dogs are _hard_ to take care of or something."

Stephen didn't save anything, had to bite his tongue against verbally eviscerating his cousin while the puppy's shakes slowly went away and it began to make more sounds than the low, constant whine it had been doing before. The poor thing looked – and felt – incredibly touch-starved. "Just call if you need someone to dog-sit for you, alright? You shouldn't leave a dog this young alone at the house for a really long time." Which was more evidence that Jack's parents didn't quite know what they were doing. "What's his name?"

"Oh, didn't know that. I'll let you know if I need help, thanks Stephen." Jack smiled at him over the book, before looking back down and turning a page. "And his name is Thoth, for the Egyptian god of wisdom. My parents said his breed was used in Ancient Egypt as a hunting dog, which is pretty cool."

Stephen watched as Thoth began to explore his apartment, sniffing here and there before running back to him to check that everything was alright before dashing off once again. "Hunting dogs tend to need a lot of exercise," he pointed out mildly, but Jack didn't seem to notice and just hummed absently from behind his book. The older of the two rolled his eyes and looked for a cloth that he didn't mind losing to a dog's rambunctiousness.

The rest of the visit followed in that pattern, Jack reading and conversing occasionally while Stephen played with the dog and fiddled around the apartment. Normally he would be reading up on business practices that were used in this time, or flipping through some magazines that focused on cameras, but with an attention-starved puppy in the house he didn't want to hyper-focus on the articles when he could be needed at some point.

At one point he turned to the teenager lounging on his couch and asked, "Are your parents pestering you about college yet? Mine didn't much but, you know." He shrugged a little as if to try and dismiss the awkwardness that bringing up his dead, fabricated parents tended to generate.

(It had been relatively easy to paint his backstory as that of a bastard child of the Drake family whose mother died when he was about seventeen, just shy of college, and had set him up to be an emancipated minor which had passed without a hitch when he had displayed his self-sufficiency. His lack of money was explained away as all being needed to get through college like she had wanted for him, and honestly Stephen was pleased that he made it all fairly logical with enough emotional parts that people rarely question him on it.)

Jack didn't seem to notice and nodded. "Yeah, they've been pushing me to go into business. Hell knows why; we're rich enough without needing _me_ to increase the family coffers. I'm thinking of pursuing archaeology, truth be told. I've loved it since I was a kid, and if I find some artifacts and ruins then that'll get us money and notoriety, right? So I'll still be getting them what they want."

Stephen hummed and soothed Thoth as he ran over crying for comfort after he bumped into the coffee table. "You could major in archaeology and minor in business perhaps. That should appease them. Only if they're helping pay for college, of course," he added. "If they aren't then go crazy, it's not their money."

They continued talking about business and archaeology for another two hours, Jack grousing about the information his father continued to shove into his head about the stock market and enthusiastically retelling excavations he'd read about while Stephen made sympathetic sounds and teased his cousin about the information Jack was shoving into _his_ head. When it finally became time for Jack to leave, he picked up Thoth and waved goodbye to his cousin, not appearing to notice the way the dog began to struggle and bark in a bid for freedom. Stephen waved and cooed a little to try and calm Thoth before Jack disappeared from view and he sighed and moved to lay down on the vacated couch.

He would have to stay in contact with Jack, at least to ensure that Thoth was being properly cared for. It was both horrible and enlightening to see that Jack's irresponsibility with things in his care did not extend solely to children, though the Jack from Stephen's time never mentioned having a dog, so Stephen has to wonder if this is a new development influenced by his presence.

He shrugged off the thoughts for the time being and opened up his laptop, hissing is disdain at the (for him) outdated tech that filled the entire machine. He began the slow process of removing the worst offenders before inserting replicas of the hardware in his gauntlet into the computer. The manufacturer he'd asked to replicate them had expressed interest in the more advanced microprocessor but only asked for a replica for himself, which Stephen allowed easily. To be frank he was losing patience with the close-but-not-enough level of technology all around him, and wasn't afraid to give it a little nudge and see what happened.

An hour later he'd finished and closed up the laptop, booting it back up and watching with relief as the startup process went by significantly faster than it had hours ago. He then let out a content sound and started looking up information he'd need for his next plan to remain financially secure.

It was time for him to play with the stock market.

* * *

Stephen swung his legs lazily on the roof of the Clocktower, eating a hot dog as he gazed at the streets below. Old Gotham didn't have as heavy pedestrian traffic as the rest of Gotham tended to but it was still there, and he figured he wasn't _actually_ shirking his responsibilities if he maintained an eye on some part of the town.

He'd just finished eating when he registered a flicker of movement heading toward the docks. He took a closer look and saw another flicker, this time able to deduce that whatever it was _wanted_ to not be seen.

And that was just _asking_ for Stephen to stick his nose in their business.

He got out his grapple gun and fired, swinging down to follow behind the second flicker of movement. He registered the alley and started looking for signs of the person's presence, using what he remembered of this area to try and sniff out where they would be hiding. He thought he had it until he ran into a dead end, and groaned.

Right. This part of Old Gotham eventually got some expansion, but that was twenty years from now. He scaled the wall and tried to look for the flicker of movement, and cursed when he realized that whoever it was had disappeared by then.

He continued his patrol through the city in a sourer mood, vowing to get some camera set up in that area. He was going to find whoever that was, especially if it was the group he suspected it to be.

His patrol took him through most of the city, with him avoiding the area where Red Hood used to patrol more out of habit than anything else. When he passed some of the more dilapidated areas he looked in the alleyways and blinked a little at the graffiti renditions of his symbol. Which reminded him – he really needed to change his symbol and suit, at least enough to not be the same thing as another Red Robin if he got sent to _another_ universe.

Some things were constant among the universes, he and Bruce had suspected when they were researching it months ago, and symbols tied to specific names could very well be one of them.

Stephen used to think Bruce and Dick's parents' deaths were constants, and boy was _he_ wrong.

Fortunately, no one was active that night, the gangs still all wary and laying low with his arrival and the larger crime families still trying to dig up dirt on him in an attempt to blackmail him. The mere thought of that made him laugh before he looked for one of his semi-safe houses and began the simple task of removing his outfit for the night and packing it up in a ratty backpack that screamed second-hand. No one suspected the poor-looking guy that lived next door to them to be a vigilante with high-tech gadgets at every turn.

Stephen whistled a cheery tune as he wandered back to his apartment, half of his attention now put into a notepad as he scribbled small insignias and humming as he considered them and crossed them off in the weak lamplight. "At this rate I'll either go no emblem or 'zoom out' and add wings to the one I already have," he considered, circling the latter after a quick sketch on the paper.

While doing this, he had been enjoying the quiet and few people that were out nearby, and tensed as he registered eyes following him. He hummed again and went to the bus stop, immediately scanning the area around him after he entered the light. His eyes ran over the surrounding area three times before he realized that he had been looking over the offender and had to bite back a smile.

Instead, he offered Jason Blood a small nod, to which the older man stared at him a moment longer before nodding back and walking away, disappearing into the growing shadows with barely a sound.

Stephen watched the warlock vanish and loosened some of his control to allow a small smile to creep upon his face. He didn't talk to the man often in his old world, but they were still both vigilantes that had lived in Gotham and so weren't exactly strangers, and seeing him again brought about a surprising amount of fondness and homesickness.

It was easy to compartmentalize with everyone else either not around or young enough to be barely recognizable, and without considering that's exactly what Stephen had done. He'd tucked away the longing for his family (ignoring the sting he felt sometimes when he thought about them, thought about how he was only there as a placeholder), the immediate pain and ache that still lingered from the absence of his friends and fellow Titans; all of that had been pushed down and locked away so that he could better settle into the world.

But now, looking at the place where Jason Blood had disappeared from sight, Stephen felt that festering pain, the sheer loneliness of it all, knowing that he would call out and no one would answer because no one was _there_ , rise up within him and barely noticed as he crushed the small notepad with the force of his clenching hand.

He stared down at his hand blankly, not paying attention to the world around him until he felt something hit his hand. He focused onto the drop of liquid sitting there, glanced up at the perfectly clear night sky, and shoved his hands into his pockets.

The walk home was a quiet, subdued affair.

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Thanks for reading and please review.


	4. Chapter 4

Don't own the DCU.

Chapter 4

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Jack didn't looked up from his book when he heard Thoth start barking and felt him straining against the leash Jack had tied to the stairway rails. "Hi Stephen," he greeted distractedly, writing down a line from the book into the notebook he'd balanced on his knee.

He heard his cousin sigh, followed by the slow quieting of his dog as Stephen likely knelt down to pet him and run him through tricks that he'd started training the dog on. Jack felt vaguely insulted; it wasn't like he didn't _try_ to go over the tricks with Thoth himself, but the dog refused to listen to him so he was slowly giving up. As long as he got trained, neither Jack nor his parents cared how that came to be.

"Jack," Stephen finally acknowledged him, and Jack frowned as he heard the sadness and exhaustion he's heard every time he's visited for the last two weeks still there, underneath the standard greeting. "I hope you weren't waiting that long."

Jack shrugged. He wouldn't know how long he was there; he kind of lost track of stuff like that when he was reading a good book. "It wasn't that long."

Stephen clearly doubted that but didn't say anything, and Jack was grateful. His parents were always on him about doing something productive every minute of the day, and visiting Stephen was a great reprieve from that kind of stress. He moved out from in the front of the door, and followed his cousin in after he'd unlocked the door and collected Thoth. Jack felt a pang at having forgotten his dog for a second before shrugging it off. He probably would've remembered quickly after getting into the apartment.

The place looked somewhat messier than it traditionally did, just like it had the last few times Jack had come by, and his concern increased even more. "Is everything alright?" Jack asked, marking his place in his book, setting it and his notebook on the still fairly new coffee table and making himself comfortable on the couch. Thoth was trailing behind Stephen as he got out a mug and started up the coffee maker. Jack managed to stop himself from rolling his eyes as he observed his cousin's caffeine addiction and waited for a response.

Stephen looked at him in confusion and leaned against the counter with the coffee maker on it. "Everything is fine, why do you ask?" In the kitchen lighting, Jack could better see the shadows under his cousin's eyes.

"You've been kind of off for a while now, that's all. I'm worried." The younger boy hated the way his face burned in embarrassment at admitting something like that to his cousin and looked away from the other to stare fixedly at his book.

He heard Stephen shift a little before letting out a large sigh. "Sorry, I'm just...coming to terms with some stuff." Jack peeked up and saw that Stephen was now looking down at his hands. Hands that were faintly trembling, Jack noticed.

He tried to stem his curiosity but felt his will give way in less than a minute. This was why he thought archaeology would be a better fit than business; he can't imagine other businessmen would take his habit of sticking his nose where it doesn't belong very well. "What stuff?"

Stephen was silent for a few minutes, and Jack felt his face burning again. He shouldn't have expected Stephen to answer, he'd already noticed how private his cousin was regarding his mom, and never liked bringing up his dad at all (which made sense, considering he probably didn't know anything about him outside of whatever his mom had told him). Why would he talk about that stuff with _Jack_ of all people? And then he made a sound, emotions there that Jack couldn't quite name, and began opening and closing his hands sporadically.

"I guess I've only recently had a chance to sit down and realize: my mom is _gone_. She's not just waiting for me to get the money I'd need to visit her, she's not avoiding calling me to give me a feel for what being adult is like, she's not gonna tease me about Caroline ever again, she's...she's _dead_." He swallowed roughly. "I think it all became a blur at first, and when I went to college it was easy to push that to the side, to think "it's alright, she's just busy" or "she doesn't want to distract me from my classes", to think that it'll all become normal after I graduate and go back home, or get my own place. You know, just a horrible denial."

"What changed?" Jack asked, almost dreading the answer. He _really_ doesn't think he should be the one to hear this.

"I saw someone a few weeks ago, she looked _just_ like one of my mom's friends, but that friend lives in Star City so it couldn't have been her. But when I saw her, I looked around for my mom and it all kind of, just...hit me."

Jack drew a blank on what to say in response to that. "Uh, my – err, condolences. Is there – that is, is there anything I can do to help?"

Stephen shook his head, pushing himself away from the counter as the coffee maker stopped producing noise and filling his mug with the dark liquid. "There's not much anyone can do, really. I just – need time to mourn, I guess."

"Alright," Jack replied dubiously and, because he still hasn't quite gotten a handle on social etiquette, asked, "will that be for much longer?"

Stephen made a strange, choked sound at that. "Probably not," he admitted. "I would guess less than a week."

"Oh, good." Jack said, relieved, before pausing. Was that considered rude? "It's just, I hate to see you so down. Thoth too, I think." Upon mentioning his dog, he looked around but couldn't find him. He was probably next to Stephen.

Stephen smiled at Jack and left the kitchen to join him on the couch, Thoth appearing and trotting at his heels. The dog jumped into Stephen's lap once he got settled, but Jack didn't notice as he picked his book back up and continued to read it, reveling in the feeling of accomplishment from helping his cousin out.

* * *

Stephen had guessed correctly on when his grief would finally abate, and now only felt a kind of emptiness that came with all of those emotions finally leaving him. Along with the tiniest smidge of guilt for lying to his cousin. But it needed to be done; he both needed to rid Jack of his worries and more firmly establish his past to the Drakes. Any inconsistencies (though he didn't see any on his part) would now be dismissed as Jack misremembering and he could potentially acquire more sympathy if Jack tells his parents everything that was spoken.

But Stephen dismissed those thoughts for the time being and instead focused on the building he'd trained his binoculars on, binoculars which he modified with zooming options and auto-focusing after one week of stakeouts with the current, inferior version had driven him to frustration.

(They fortunately already had night vision technology integrated into them but, to his chagrin, thermal imaging technology was still classified and he didn't want classified technology lying around his civilian apartment or in one of his not-safe safe houses. Besides, if it continued to work without difficulties for another month, he planned on patenting it and selling the patent to the military if possible. He was already playing with the stock market and suspected the manufacturer who'd replicated his processor for him wouldn't stay quiet for much longer if he hadn't already started making even more of the hardware, so it wasn't like technology was going to advance the way it did on his first universe. Might as well improve lives and benefit from it at the same time.)

He zoomed in as he registered shadows moving along the ground toward the building, and smirked in triumph. It was a group of ninja, all of them quite skilled by their body language, but they clearly hadn't been expecting Stephen to wait up until four in the morning to spot them.

Joke's on them, he's been stalking them for the past two weeks while patrolling and he'd taken the next day off in preparation for this.

 _Looks like Ra's is already sinking his claws into Gotham_ , Stephen mused. _I can't imagine anything I've done currently would have attracted him to Gotham earlier than planned, so for now I'll operate under the assumption that this is all concurrent with my original world's timeline. Fine by me, I always wondered what would happen if you kicked down an ant hill when the hill was barely even formed. Do the ants stay and keep at it or leave for safer territories?_ He tucked away his binoculars and took out his bo staff. _Let's find out._

Stephen barely made a sound as he swung into position and dropped down, the ninja farthest in the back turning into his convenient landing pad and getting knocked out instantly. The others spun around but Stephen was already in motion, staff out and jabbing hard into their sternums before being spun and hitting them in the back of the head as they desperately tried to regain their breath. Stephen heard movement to the side and shifted his staff to be wielded with one hand, lashing out with the other and taking out the ninja there with a nerve strike to the neck.

Stephen stood in the middle of this self-made carnage, confirming that there were no additional sounds of people approaching and that everyone he'd knocked out were all still breathing steadily. _That...was_ way _too easy. Looks like years of trying to one-up Bruce actually_ did _motivate the Demon's head to improve the quality of his men._ Stephen felt an ominous grin creep onto his face. _They are_ so _screwed._

And indeed they were. The ninja were all skilled for the time period but, without several vigilantes, heroes, and rival assassin groups to make them evolve and improve to survive, they were easy pickings for a vigilante that had been fighting more skilled versions of them for years. Stephen tore through their ranks with ease, putting them all down with as little damage as he could, though there were a few broken noses here and there that Stephen mentally argued had to do more with them not blocking properly than anything intentional on his part. _At the very least, I probably just found some of Pru's future instructors._

With everyone sufficiently subdued and the more squirrelly ones he'd noted while fighting tied up, Stephen made his way through the building and found what he was looking for: the large computer likely keeping them in contact with their primary base. The landline nearby reinforced the image.

It only took a few minutes of typing and hooking his glove up to the computer to have it routing all of its information to an isolated server he'd set up (hey, you can never be too careful. Ra's might _actually_ be ahead of the technology curve at this point in time).

"You left people lying around outside," a voice said from behind him, and Stephen didn't bother twitching as he turned his head to look at the person.

He nodded in brief greeting. "Batman. Long time no see."

He saw the Batman turn his head slightly in what looked like puzzlement and drop the ninja he was carrying to the ground. "Shrike," he greeted in turn, still sounding off-balance. "I never told you my name."

Stephen held his head in place and gaze level so that he could best emulate the incredulous stare he was giving the man behind his cowl. When Batman began to shift (and _really_. Batman, _uncomfortable_? Even without seeing young Bruce running around Stephen could tell it wasn't him) Stephen broke himself ou of his stupor and shrugged a little. "You have a giant bat symbol on your chest. I just assumed..." he trailed off awkwardly and let the silence build back up. Maybe he went by a different name and Batman was an old name he went by?

The man calmed in the face of the logic presented to him. "Ah. That makes sense. You are correct, I go by Batman." The man paused again, obviously putting his thoughts together, and Stephen finished what he was doing and began changing around some of the database he had access to while he waited. "You modified your outfit," Batman finally noted, and Stephen smiled.

"Yup. Just wanted to improve on the symbol and add some more resemblance to my namesake." He'd changed the clasp as he had designed it a few weeks ago and added a white streak to his cape, along with giving the "beak" of his cowl a sharper look. He'd contemplated adding some red accents to the leggings or boots but decided to wait on that. Overall Stephen was pleased with the changes, even if he still greatly resembled another universe's Red Robin.

The Batman hummed before focusing on why he was there in the first place. "What are you doing?"

"I found these League of Assassins members here and just wanted to see what they were up to. It looks like they were here mostly to establish a base in such a crime-ridden city, rather than here specifically for a hit."

Batman looked surprised. "I did not think this city that bad in the crime department."

Stephen quirked a brow up in surprise to that statement. "While the city doesn't appear to have any enhanced villains or enhanced-based crimes being committed, it still has a long history of crime family feuds and violent gang wars from what I've seen. And my sudden appearance is already losing its intimidation factor; people are creeping back out of the woodwork." Not to mention the other simple fact most upper class Gothamites don't tend to notice: the police were already quite corrupted and only served and protected either the richest person in the area or the one who'd paid them the most at the time of an incident. He'd confirmed that suspicion within the first two weeks of patrol.

Batman hummed and nodded. "I'd never considered the richer families in the area being the leading proponents on crime. I suppose that would mean that there are indeed several groups in constant conflict with affluent backers, should every family have a different group they supported."

Stephen blinked a little at that, unnoticed beneath his cowl, and added, "Either incredibly naïve or has far more faith in humanity than most vigilantes I've seen working out of Gotham," to the mental dossier he was compiling of this strange Batman. Aloud he simply hummed in acknowledgement, and the two remained silent as he finished downloading as much info as he could manage to his remote isolated server for future study.

Once that was completed, the two shared a nod and disappeared down different streets, Stephen somewhat unnerved by the footsteps he heard echoing behind him. _I might need to actually gear out this other Batman before his lack of tech gets him into serious trouble. And what a strange thought_ that _is._

* * *

Thanks for reading and please review.


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